Re: Hard Sci-fi?

In message 
<5321bc15-654c-4b3f-bcc5-0e69c74c05e2@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, 
DougL <lampert.doug@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> writes

>
>For that matter as far as anyone can tell WRITING able to do more than
>simple accounting was invented by and for religions.

I'm not sure about inventing it, but the Church was certainly 
instrumental in teaching the populace how to read and write. The monk 
Alcuin taught the court of Charlemagne to read and write, and that was 
the start of the spread of literacy to the hoi polloi within Europe.

It's true that some time later the Church adopted a policy of keeping 
the Bible in Latin so that the general populace couldn't read it. That 
was a tem****ary aberration though.

In more recent times churches have been very active in teaching literacy 
pretty much everywhere. There is a side issue in that they also tend to 
teach religion to the same students, but in some places they aren't 
permitted to do that but continue to teach literacy and other useful 
skills.



-- 
Bernard Peek
London, UK. DBA, Manager, Trainer & Author.